SC - punishment for selling bad meat

[Stefan li Rous]

Bear said:
> Most towns had very stringent regulations about butchering and holding meat.
> Fresh meat was just that, fresh.  In most circumstances, meat would be
> butchered on the day it was to be sold within the public view and the
> butchered meat would be held no more than two days.  Meat still in the
> possession of the butcher at the beginning of a fast would be destroyed by
> the butcher as directed by the guild and the municipal authorities.
> Butchers found selling spoiled meat were subject to fine, pillory, seizure
> of goods, forfeiture of business for a fixed period, and expulsion by the
> guild, depending on the town and on the number and seriousness of the
> offenses.

Or worse. The rules of emperor Fredrick II made these rules for the tradesmen
and craftsmen in his kingdom of Sicily:

"Anyone taken in fraud for the first time, if he makes false goods,  or
sells rotten food, or watered wine, will pay one pound of pure gold to
our treasury. If he cannot pay, he must be beaten. For a second offense,
he must lose a hand, and for a third he must suffer death on the forks."
[Constitutions of Melfi, 1231]

This from the "Those Who Worked - An Anthology of Medieval Sources" that
I mentioned in an earlier message.

I think this is another argument against the idea that rotten meat
was common in the Middle Ages and disguised with spices argument. I
really doubt that the folks at Food Lion would have been selling
the rotten meat they did if we had penalties like this.
- -- 
Lord Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
Mark S. Harris             Austin, Texas           stefan at texas.net
**** See Stefan's Florilegium files at:
          http://www.pbm.com/~lindahl/rialto/rialto.html ****
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